Date: July 17, 2017

TAKING HRT WILL DELAY MENOPAUSE

This is one of the commonest myths on menopause and its treatment. Every so often a patient will tell me: “I will have to go through symptoms anyway when I stop the treatment so I might as well do that now and be done with it”

This is really not true.

The duration of menopause symptoms is different and genetically predetermined for each woman.

It can vary from 1 to 10 years and sometimes more and there is no scientific way to know how long symptoms will last for you.

What happens is that if you stop treatment after 4 years and your symptoms were meant to last for three then you will not have them again.

If you stop treatment after 4 years and your symptom will meant to last for 8 then you will still have symptoms when you stop because it is too early for you to stop.

This is something that has created a lot of confusion and brought women to believe that symptoms will return when treatment is stopped.

It is a very personal decision if to start on not treatment but being fearful of having a delayed menopause should not be a factor.